With ten days until a possible government shutdown, the battle over federal spending has shifted to the Democratic-controlled Senate, where Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid’s (D-Nev.) chamber will begin considering — and amending — a House-passed bill that keeps the government open and defunds President Barack Obama’s legislative crown jewel: the 2010 Affordable Care Act.

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House GOP celebrate 'victory'

McCain: Defunding 'not rational'

Schumer on GOP: 'They'll blink'

The House vote late Friday morning was 230-189, with Republican Rep. Scott Rigell (Va.) as the only Republican to vote against the $986 billion, three-month package. Democratic Reps. Mike McIntyre of North Carolina and Jim Matheson of Utah crossed the aisle and voted for the bill. Matheson and McIntyre both opposed Obamacare’s passage.

The Republican-drafted continuing resolution, or CR, keeps the government operating until Dec. 15, allowing the House and Senate time to try to reach deals on the 12 individual appropriations bills. None of those bills has been enacted yet.

But the CR is certain to return to Speaker John Boehner’s (R-Ohio) chamber next week in drastically different shape following Senate action — Reid has said that defunding Obamacare is “dead” and Democrats can strip out the language with a simple majority. Nonetheless, Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Texas) — who started the defund movement —says he will do whatever he can, including a talking filibuster, to stall the measure’s passage in the upper chamber.

Once the Senate returns its version of the CR to the House, it’s unclear how Boehner and other House GOP leaders will then react. Boehner is likely to receive the funding bill mere days away from a government shutdown, but Republican lawmakers and leadership aides say he might amend the Senate’s version and ship it back to the upper chamber.

Following Friday’s rare display of party unity, the House Republican Conference will be tested next week when the bill returns. In a closed-door House GOP meeting before the CR vote, Pennsylvania Republican Rep. Mike Kelly urged his colleagues to stick with Boehner.

“I don’t want this to be like Palm Sunday, where we bring the speaker in on a little donkey and then next Friday, we crucify him,” Kelly said, according to several sources.

A statement released by Rigell on Thursday explained that he would vote against the funding measure because CRs are an inappropriate means by which to plan government budgeting. He wants a return to regular order

“There is universal agreement that funding the federal government with Continuing Resolutions damages the economy and our nation’s military, yet they are now seen as acceptable if not inevitable,” Rigell wrote in a statement. “ … The CR is a perfect legislative vehicle to advance our shared goal of returning to regular order.”

The politics of these fiscal showdowns couldn’t represent clearer jockeying for political advantage. House Majority Leader Eric Cantor (R-Va.) — once a top attack dog for Republicans who has recently taken a more congenial tone — wondered aloud about whether red state Senate Democrats up for reeelction in 2014, namely Mary Landrieu of Louisana, Kay Hagan of North Carolina and Mark Begich of Alaska, would vote to fund Obamacare.

Senate Democrats, meanwhile, blasted the House Republican CR as empty showmanship that plays to the GOP base but is not a serious example of legislating.

“Republicans are simply postponing for a few days the inevitable choice they must face: pass a clean bill to fund the government, or force a shutdown,” Reid said in a statement following a House vote. “I have said it before but it seems to bear repeating: the Senate will not pass any bill that defunds or delays Obamacare.”

Reid added: “Democrats stand ready to work with reasonable people who want to improve it, but Republican attempts to take an entire law hostage simply to appease the Tea Party anarchists are outrageous, irresponsible and futile.”

The CR battle is just the first piece of a two-part fiscal showdown this fall. The nation’s $16.7 trillion debt limit needs to be lifted in mid-October, and House Republicans are planning to vote on that next week. They return on Wednesday, only days before a possible shutdown. The Senate will be in session starting Monday.

Right now, the two sides are far apart on both the CR and debt ceiling. Reid and some Senate Republicans — such as John McCain of Arizona — say that attempting to defund Obamacare is a futile task. Boehner, Cantor, and Majority Whip Kevin McCarthy (R-Calif.) realize that, but the trio was dragged to the right by their party’s rank-and-file into a more combative stance.

Boehner and his lieutenants think they have found a winning combination — pass a hard-line government funding package that pleases the large group of tea party inspired House Republicans, and let Reid, President Barack Obama and Senate Republicans respond to their effort.

“Americans are tired of seeing the government spend more and more of their hard-earned tax dollars,” Cantor said on the House floor on Friday. “This resolution will also protect the working middle class from the devastating effects of Obamacare.”

At a boisterous “rally” of House Republicans following the vote, Boehner was just as strident.

“It’s time for us to say no” to Obamacare, Boehner declared. “Our message to the United States Senate is real simple — the American people don’t want the government shut down, and they don’t want Obamacare.”

Boehner’s comments reflect his view, and that of many other House and Senate Republicans that they will make Obamacare the centerpiece of their 2014 election strategy. And they believe strongly that it’s a winning message.

House Democrats bashed the GOP-drafted CR as a meaningless stunt and urged Boehner to negotiate a bipartisan deal.

New York Rep. Nita Lowey, the top Democrat on the Appropriations Committee, accused the GOP of “brinksmanship.”

“The Republican budget plan itself shortchanges American jobs in infrastructure, results in education and defense layoffs, closes Head Start and afterschool programs, and divests in health research,” she said.

Leaders in the Democratic-controlled Senate have already warned the spending bill is dead on arrival there with the Obamacare provision attached.

Reid will move to strip the Obamacare language from the funding bill and send it back to the House as early as the middle of next week.

The House will then have to decide whether to accept that bill or amend it and send it back to the Senate. House GOP aides expect these negotiations to last into late next week, and possibly into the weekend.

In a sign of the gridlock to come, Reid and Obama have have vowed that they will not negotiate over raising the debt limit, framing it as absolutely necessary for the United States to pay its bills.

Failure on either of these negotiations could lead to political and economic catastrophe. Republican polls show that, while Obamacare is unpopular, voters do not favor a government shutdown in order to defund or delay it.

And if Congress fails to lift the debt ceiling, the nation may be unable to pay all its bills, which would cause a huge blow to global financial markets and likely affect any U.S. economic recovery.